


The Strength to Leave

by Bluewolf458



Series: Escape [1]
Category: The Sentinel
Genre: Gen, Sentinel Bingo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-05
Updated: 2018-04-05
Packaged: 2019-04-18 21:44:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 353
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14222409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bluewolf458/pseuds/Bluewolf458
Summary: Steven is the rebel, the brother who chooses to leave.





	The Strength to Leave

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the 2018 Sentinel Bingo prompt 'role reversal'

The Strength to Leave

by Bluewolf

William Ellison was far from happy.

While his older son Jimmy had obediently entered the family business after he left school, his younger son Stevie was proving recalcitrant.

"Business is boring!" Stevie snapped. "I want to do something more exciting!"

And while secretly Jimmy agreed with Stevie, he was too... well, brainwashed by his domineering father to say anything. And he envied Stevie his ability to brush off their father's often brutal discipline.

Sometimes, especially when he was in bed but still wide awake, Jimmy thought back to the happier days when his mother was still alive. She had believed him when he spoke of seeing things far away, of hearing faint sounds... his father didn't believe him, punished him for making things up... After one particularly harsh punishment when he was ten he had somehow pushed his sensitive sight and hearing away, but he missed them. He missed seeing all the subtle colors in a sunset, he missed hearing the bats calling as they flittered among the trees in the garden, hunting small insects...

He thought sometimes that would like to move away, find his own house where he might have a modicum of relief from the constant disapproval aimed at him by his father. But in William's book, his only excuse for finding his own house would be if he married. And Jimmy had no intention of marrying.

In any case, he was far from sure that he could manage to live on his own. His father had convinced him that he would be totally unable to manage to survive if he had to make his own decisions.

And then Stevie walked out on his eighteenth birthday, leaving a note saying that he would not be back; that he was able to make his own way in life.

That night, Jimmy lay in bed wishing that he had the strength of mind to walk out, the way Stevie had.

He bitterly resented his father's treatment of him... but William had convinced him that he was useless. And William was the god who ruled his life.


End file.
